ADVOCATES FOR FAITH & FREEDOM
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Wednesday, April 16, 2025
CONTACT: Nicole Velasco
NVELASCO@FAITH-FREEDOM.COM
Murrieta, CA— Today, Advocates for Faith and Freedom appealed a United States District Court for the Southern District of California’s decision granting the State of California’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Senate Bill 277 (SB 277), the 2016 law that eliminated all personal and religious belief exemptions from California’s state law which requires 17 vaccinations for K-12 school attendance.[1] Despite the district court's decision to dismiss the case, Advocates for Faith & Freedom is appealing to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to protect religious liberty and parental rights in education.
The plaintiffs in the case, four California mothers, brought this challenge to SB 277 on the grounds that the law violates their First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion and to live out and remain faithful to their sincerely held religious beliefs by raising their children in accordance with their family’s shared faith. For families who object to vaccinations on religious grounds, California law effectively bans their children from attending both public and private schools in California.
“This law targets families of faith by denying them the basic right to make medical and educational decisions. The law takes the drastic step of banning children from the schoolhouse due to their sincerely held religious beliefs and those of their families. Yet, the law makes numerous exemptions for non-religious reasons such as the student’s age, need for specialized learning accommodations, availability of vaccination records, etc. The parents we represent think remaining true to their faith is at least as important as the numerous non-faith based categories that California already exempts,” said Robert Tyler, President of Advocates for Faith & Freedom. “We are appealing because California cannot simply erase the Constitution when it becomes politically inconvenient. This is about more than vaccines,” Mr. Tyler added. “It’s about the future of religious liberty and parental rights in America.”
In its ruling, the district court held that SB 277 is a “neutral and generally applicable” law, even though it permits secular exemptions for a number of secular reasons while offering no accommodation for religious beliefs. This double standard sets a dangerous precedent, tipping the scales of power from parents to the State in matters of personal belief and family life.
“At the heart of this case is a simple truth: parents, not the State, are the rightful stewards of their children’s wellbeing,” said Advocates attorney Julianne Fleischer. “We cannot remain silent while the government tramples the constitutional rights of Christian families whose only ‘offense’ is raising their children according to their faith.”
[1] https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CID/DCDC/CDPH%20Document%20Library/Immunization/IMM-231.pdf
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Advocates for Faith & Freedom is a non-profit law firm dedicated to protecting constitutional and religious liberty in the courts. Our mission is to engage in cases that will uphold our religious liberty and America’s heritage and to educate Americans about our fundamental constitutional rights.